Less than 24 hours after its launch, one of the first custom design accelerators based on the Radeon HD 5870 have began to surface, one of the first ones made by Sapphire. Whether or not this is a complete custom design (includes custom designed PCB and coolers), Sapphire is ready with at least its Vapor-X cooler designed for the new GPU. This picture found on Xtreme Systems forums shows the cooler fitted on the AMD reference PCB. However, a newly announced contest conducted by Hexus.net shows a CGI drawing of the accelerator in its promotional graphic, which shows the PCB to be slightly shorter, and blue in colour. One can also see from the drawing that the PCI-E power connectors are located at the same spot where they were located on most Radeon HD 4890 accelerators. Hopefully cheaper, or at least factory-overclocked accelerators aren't far away.

Wow, they're finally coming out with one of these when a new card series is introduced so they have a chance to sell some! Lets just hope these actually make to retail outlets and don't cost too much more than a reference card.
*crosses fingers*Don't let me down Sapphire!

It does look good. Would be nice if they would use a black PCB and leave the PCI power connectors in the same orientation as on the AMD reference design. This would help with keeping the overall length installed shorter. You wouldn't have to have the extra length of the power plugs and cable in the way.

Looks good, but I can't understand placing the fan i nthe dead center, half the heat is going to be pushed out into the case.

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Yeah, but it definitely works best for cooling the GPU as far as my experience. If you have good airflow in your case, it really doesn't matter. Oh, I forgot to mention, the airflow is also directed right onto the vrm's as well keeping them much cooler than the stock cooler.

Are these Vapor-X editions also more silent or do they just reduce the temps?

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the Vapor X coolers on my 4870s were a LOT quieter and cooled better then the Toxic heatpipe coolers did (no comparason).

Edit: there are 2 different fans pictured above. The first blade looks like the Toxic cooler fan and the second pict has a more developed (better) fan blade, I wonder what blade they will use in the final one?

one other tidbit, the Vapor X coolers/Toxic on the 4870s were steel.(not alum or copper). These coolers look like the Toxic cooler thats been modified, I hope these are better made.

Here is a shot of the poorly designed Toxic cooler from a 4870(notice the heat tubes smashed flat)